


Gathering

by HerbertBest



Category: Game Grumps
Genre: Bad Cooking, Family Feels, Gen, Holidays, Humor, Kid Fic
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-12-21
Updated: 2016-12-21
Packaged: 2018-09-10 22:21:22
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,304
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8941666
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/HerbertBest/pseuds/HerbertBest
Summary: Zip hosts her first family get-together.It does not go well.





	

**Author's Note:**

  * For [TheseusInTheMaze](https://archiveofourown.org/users/TheseusInTheMaze/gifts).



> Happy holidays!! I hope you love this one!

“Bring cigarettes.”

Rhea raised an eyebrow at her screen. “I thought you quit two years ago.” 

Zip’s voice went up another octave. “I know. I need them. Now.”

“Riggght. I’ll see if Bonnie has anything left in her stash.” Rhea was rummaging around in her kitchen cupboards, trying to find the cookies Bonnie had bought for the occasion. Hopefully their kid hadn’t eaten all of them while they weren't looking. “Are you sure you don’t want to get catering or something?”

“No.” Zip rubbed her temples. “Please tell me you’re not bringing the skunk.”

“Baby and me are a package deal. You knew this when you asked me to come.”

Zip groaned. In the background one of her kids yelled for her and Rhea heard the gushy sound of something heavy being shoved up a turkey’s backside. “I’m touching actual meat,” she said. “You guys had better appreciate this.”

“Abba will worship the ground you walk on for taking it off Mom and Howie’s hands.” Rhea leaned against the doorjam. “Everyone else will try.” 

Zip groaned. “You have safta’s latke recipe, right?”

“Texted it last night. Good luck trying to make it. And don’t let abba near the stove, he’s even worse in there than I am.”

“Thanks. I love you too.”

“Back atcha. Oh, and one more thing: are you still seeing Alberto?”

“Oh no, he’s old news – I’m with Alejandro now.”

“Lemme guess – he’s an artist too?”

“You don’t understand….”

“…He’s special. Yeah, yeah, I get it.”

*** 

Zip’s hacienda was, for all intensive purposes, exactly what Howie had fondly called it the first time she’d visited – a commune. She shared the place with two kids, a pot bellied pig called Petunia, one nameless cat, an ex-lover and her current lover. It was a fine arrangement until her family descended.

Fuck. This was why she’d always happily gone home every winter with the kids while Mister Kind of Right had the house to himself.

She wiped a handful of mashed potatoes against her forehead and let out a moan. Pollock chose that exact moment to come out of his room, and he eyed her from the stairway. “You look like the abominable marshmallow man, mommy.”

“Thank you dear,” she grunted. “Why are you here?”

“Saba’s car just pulled up!” a knock at the kitchen door sent her nervously toward it, but Pollock had no real reservations. “Saba Dan, Pop Pop, Gammy, Glam-ma, Ross!”

Zip groaned as she accepted hugs from her family members. She called upstairs for Georgia, and the baby came down with her doll. Suzy immediately scooped up the baby, and Arin fussed over Pollock. 

“How is dinner coming?” Dan asked.

“It’s coming!” Zip blurted out. He side-eyed the oven as Holly checked it.

“Are you sure you have it at the right temperature? You have to do it slowly.”

“325, six hours,” said Zip. “Did I mention I bought a menorah?” She took their jackets and mounded them on the kitchen table.

“Wow,” Dan said, “I haven’t had one in the house for years.” She laughed nervously. Shit, when was the last time they’d lit one?

Two minutes later Rhea arrived, Bonnie on her arm and the baby in her embrace. Zip rushed her, and their hug was frantic. 

“Are you hiding a turkey in your jacket?”

“Nope.” She unzipped her jacket and Georgia tried to squirm her way out of Suzy’s arms, squeaking. The baby always did love Baby. 

“You brought the skunk?” Ross deadpanned.

“Of course! Can’t leave her alone for a second,” said Rhea happily. Bonnie traded Arin Pollock for baby Dan and Dan patiently waited his turn to hold his namesake. 

“Has anyone heard from Cammy?”

“She had another lecture to get through,” said Rhea. “And I think Jemma’s got all the kids packed together and is road tripping it up with Ella.”

“Who is going to have a comedy special for us to watch.”

Holly smiled proudly. She had a funny child! It was a weird miracle, sort of. Of course that child tended to use the entire pack as fodder for her routine. It was a fair trade-off.

Dan settled little Dan on his hip and chucked his head onto Zip’s shoulder. “We’re all proud of you, honey. We know you’re trying. C’mon, I’ll pour some oil for Safta’s latkes…”

He trailed off as a tall, muscular man peeped around the corner of the upstairs landing.

“Oh,” he said in a sleepy Argentinean accent, “I thought you had left.”

*** 

By the time Jemma and Ella arrived with the kids things had gotten awkward. Zip’s latest guy was wearing a speedo in the living room and someone had turned Miracle on 34th Street on while Suzy distributed presents. Dan was rocking the baby in his arms, Holly was running back and forth into the kitchen and Ross and Rhea were teaching Baby how to play dead, to Pollock and Georgia’s delight. 

“We could turn around without anyone noticing,” Ella whispered. Her sister dug her elbow into her side; she happened to love family holidays, and she wanted Ella to do so too. Bart and Rhonda were amazingly patient and excited as the Grands fussed over them.

Ella’s phone rang – sure enough, it was Cammy. “Uh, good news and bad news. Good news – my flight will be there at midnight. Bad news – that’s dependent on them de-icing the wings.”

“Are you in the North Pole or Fort Worth?” Ella said.

“Ha ha. Give me to Zip, will you?”

Ella flopped down among her nieces and nephews. She was good, after all, at distracting people – and in ten minutes when Zip started to scream at Cammy, she knew they needed a good distraction.

*** 

It was Holly who found Zip frantically smoking a quarter of a cigarette in her own back yard. “Zip?” she called. “The turkey just came out. It looks good. Are you gonna be all right?”

“Oh sure. My whole family saw my boyfriend in the buff, my sister’s stuck in a blizzard, my other sister brought their skunk to the party, Ella’s writing a routine about the time I threw up on a guy in biology class and Jemma left Tony.”

“Well, no holidays’ perfect…wait, Jemma left Tony?” Zip groaned and hung her head, but Holly squeezed her shoulder hard. “You, T'Ziporah Hanson, are working your butt off to make this all go smoothly. I admire the crap out of you for it.”

She smiled. “Thanks, Howie.” She sniffed the air. “Wait, what’s that smell?”

“Well, Dan said he was going to make latkes…”

They both rushed in the direction of Dan’s cry of dismay.

 

**** 

Zip sat happily at her dining room table. In spite of all of the fussing and aggravation, this was her family. This was her pack. 

Her Abba with half an eyebrow, her Dad, already making plans to tell the story on the show; Mom, grinning and bearing it; Howie, with her beauty and wise advice; Ross, who had posted videos of half of this drama on his social media; her sister the zookeeper with her skunk at her ankle and her son on her knee; her sister the i-pad, eating a McDonald’s burger at a hotel; her sister the mom, wondering where her life was going but still trying for her kids; her sister the comedian. Her man, who had put on pants. Her kids, who were wide-eyed and hungry.

This was their pack. The love that stood between them was as real as the sun and the moon and the stars. This was their family. And the love was as real as anything in the world. 

“Does anyone have anything to say?” she asked, picking up a glass of apple cider for a toast.

“Yes. Could someone adjust me?” Cammy asked. “I can’t see over the centerpiece.”


End file.
